Which Cover Was a Favorite?

“I always think that it’s wrong to put images of my protagonists on the cover of my novels because readers can identify with characters only if they are given the chance to imagine them independently.” ― Orhan Pamuk, The Innocence of Objects

Cover art is so much fun to see and to talk about. We’ve all been told that you can’t judge a book by the cover. Usually whoever said that wasn’t actually talking about a book at all but merely reminding us that looks can be misleading at times. However, if we are actually talking about books, the cover does influence our response to the book. If we are in a book store and browsing a shelf of new books, the cover can be what makes us reach out and pick a book up to give it a better look. That’s the job of cover art.

I’ve written many different types of books and have been fortunate to have some lovely covers that perhaps have gotten readers to pluck my book off a shelf or to click on an internet link to read more about my stories.

In my recent newsletter, I asked readers to pick a favorite cover from my already published books. The results surprised me. Not all the respondents had read all the books. Some of them clicked on my website and took a virtual tour of the covers to pick a favorite. Others perhaps picked covers because they were influenced by remembering the story between the covers.

Many of the readers mentioned what they liked about this or that cover. A couple mentioned a problem they had with covers like In the Shadow of the River. Here’s what they said.

I can’t wait to read your latest novel – however, I am not a fan of a cover showing only the back of the character. I want to see her face! ~Helen

Personally, I find it strange to see the back of the cover model. Seems weird, but I guess it makes sense in most cases—things they are gazing off at, etc. ~Bonnie

Then on my last blog post, Donna Jean made this opposite comment. I love the cover to your new book, wondering what she is thinking about…I like pictures taken from the back of the person – leaves a lot to the imagination.

Many book covers do show the back of the protagonist or sometimes just part of the main character’s body. The reason is often as the quote at the top of my post states. The book cover designers want the reader to be able to imagine the character without seeing his or her face. Several of my book covers have left the characters’ faces a mystery up to the reader to determine. These Healing Hills and An Appalachian Summer show the back of the main character. When the Meadow Blooms shows the character’s face, but she’s a small figure in that blooming meadow. Then Tansy on her horse on the cover of Along a Storied Trail is too far down the trail to see what she looks like.

Two other of my books, Angel Sister and River to Redemption have beautiful little girls on the cover. The Shaker books, on the other hand, mostly have covers where the heroine is very visible except for The Refuge where again we see the girl’s back on the Shaker road. Jocie is very visible on the second release Heart of Hollyhill covers.  The first releases of those stories had covers that had no character images. Christmas at Harmony Hill, a cover chosen by six readers, also is a scene without characters. And then there are my Hidden Springs mysteries that highlight the cats in the stories. Those covers were chosen as favorites by fifteen readers with Murder Comes by Mail being the narrow winner among the three.

The over all favorite cover chosen by those who responded to my newsletter was These Healing Hills. Readers liked the autumn mountain scene and a few chose it because of the dog. That’s my favorite part of the cover! 🙂 I had to wonder if they were influenced by it being autumn.

Second favorite was Along a Storied Trail because of that lovely blue color and the promise of that horseback librarian. Third was a close race between When the Meadow Blooms and An Appalachian Summer. The flowers on both attracted the readers’ eyes with many mentions of the purple colors on An Appalachian Summer. Obviously many people love the color purple. I was a little surprised Angel Sister and River to Redemption didn’t draw a few more votes for the little girls. The other votes were scattered out among the various covers with a few picking the cover of Words Spoken True. One said she loved the girl’s hat. I do too.

I found it very interesting to read about everyone’s favorites and their reasons why when they chose to share that. Of course, many of the people said they had a hard time picking a favorite because they liked all my covers.

What do you think about book cover art? Do you like when heroine’s face is hidden or would you rather see a cover that shows more about the character? 

And the Winners Are:

The winners of my newsletter giveaway are Annette of Texas and Patti from Michigan.  Watch for another newsletter to come in the next few days.

As always, thanks for reading!